TEAM LAST CALL

Have you ever thought to yourself, “I wonder if any of my friends is eating a sandwich right now? And if so, is there lettuce? What about cheese?”
Well, I’ve got good news. The answer to those and equally important questions (“Is there mayo?”) can be found on the social networking website known as Twitter, where people of all ages, races, religions and sexual orientations gather to, through the miracle of wireless technology, slowly bore each other to death.
For the uninitiated: Twitter is a service that allows subscribers to create posts of up to 140 characters at a time and send them directly to other Twitter users. These posts – or “tweets,” as they’re called by people for whom dignity isn’t a priority – can be about virtually anything that pops into the author’s head, including, but not limited to, such popular topics as “It’s raining outside,” “I’m in the mood for tacos” and “Kittens are so cute.”
In other words, if an epiphany is what you’re searching for, Twitter might not be the tool for you. Conversely, if you firmly believe that the world needs to know each and every time you have oatmeal for breakfast, you might be the right kind of tool for Twitter.
Here’s a tweet from Todd, who is wearing a new shirt today. Here’s a tweet from Bill, who thinks that moms are hot. And here’s a tweet from Jill, who – OMG! – is eating a sandwich! And to think that you almost missed it! I mean, where would you be without this type of insta-communication in your life? Having sex, probably.
Ultimately, Twitter boils down to millions of people devoting their time to methodically narrating the minute-by-minute activities of lives that might actually be interesting if they weren’t spent almost entirely on Twitter. Oh, paradox! Fortunately for those people, being interesting is hardly a prerequisite for tweeting. Exhibit A: the single most popular Twitter user is Ashton Kutcher, who is dumber than ham loaf.
Some users take it very personally when you make fun of Twitter. “Stop the h8!” they say. “No 1 is 4cing U to look!”
Then they send out a tweet like: “Why do people PARK in a DRIVEway, and DRIVE on a PARKway?!?!!?? LOL! What’s up with that?! ROTFL LMAO OMG BRB L8R” and prove my whole point. Sure, Twitter has some attractive surface qualities, but underneath, it’s nothing but a mind-numbing wasteland of moronic half-thoughts and Hallmark Card platitudes. So basically, Twitter is Sarah Palin.
My young coworkers have tried for two years to convince me of the virtues of Twitter. “You should start your own account,” they say. “We can follow each other.”
“But we sit within 10 feet of each other for eight hours a day,” I answer. “Can’t I just, like, tell you what I’m thinking?” At which point they grab their phones and start sending out tweets about how Old Man Royer just doesn’t get it. Which I totally don’t.
But despite their ridicule, I have stood my ground and refused to start an account, based largely on my longstanding belief that stupid things are dumb. Twitter is just not for me. It’s not for you, either. Know who it’s for? Miley Cyrus, whose last tweet was (and I quote): “I am craving 1. Subway sandwich 2. Whopper from BK 3. A white chocolate mocha frap :( I’m veryy veryy hungee”
I don’t know what depresses me more: The fact that she actually used the word “hungee”; the fact that she thinks anyone would ever care what she wants to eat; the fact that her 1,660,046 followers really do care; or the fact that my coworker is one of those followers.
In the interest of full disclosure, I admit that I did sign up for Twitter for a brief period of time, mostly because it’s hard to write about something you know nothing about. That’d be like a goldfish writing an article about space travel, or the Steelers writing a book about not looking stupid in gold tights. So, against every fiber of my being, including the fiber that says thirty-somethings shouldn’t be reading tweets written by Miley Cyrus, I created an account. I have to say, I was sort of excited. I was about to join the Twitter revolution, to discover what had millions of people so freaking cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs that they spent all day with their noses glued to their phones. I logged in, took a deep breath, put my feet up on my desk and waited for the winds of social networking to sweep me away.
Then it came, the moment I had been waiting for. My first tweet. And it said … wait for it … wait for it …
“I like dogs.”
OMG. L8R.